Friday, December 19, 2014

Christmas is full of meaningful things. One of them has been hijacked by the consumer culture that instead of the Child Jesus, prefers the figure of the good old man, Santa Claus, because he is more appealing to business. The Child Jesus, on the other hand, speaks of the inner child we carry within us who feels the need to be cared for and when fully grown, has the impulse to care. It's that piece of paradise that wasn't totally lost, made of innocence, spontaneity, charm, playfulness and coexistence with others without discrimination.

For Christians, it's the celebration of the "proximity and humanity" of our God, as it says in the Epistle to Titus (3:4). God allowed Himself to fall in love with human beings so He wanted to be one of them. As Fernando Pessoa says beautifully in his poem about Christmas: "He is the eternal Child, the God that was missing. He is the Divine that laughs and plays. He's a child as human as he is divine."

Now we have a child God and not a God who's a stern judge of our actions and of human history. What inner joy we feel when we think that we will be judged by a child God! Rather than condemn us, He wants to live and be entertained with us forever.

His birth caused a cosmic upheaval. A text of the Christian liturgy says it in a symbolic way: "Then the leaves that were rustling stopped as though dead; then the wind that was whispering stood still in the air; then the rooster that was singing stopped in the middle of his song; then the waters of the creek that were running became still; then the sheep that were grazing, froze; then the shepherd who raised his staff, remained as if turned to stone; so in that moment everything stopped, all was silent, everything suspended its course -- Jesus was born, the Savior of the people and the universe."

Christmas is a feast of life, of universal brotherhood, a feast of the family gathered around one table. More than eating, we share each other's lives and the generous fruits of our Mother Earth and the culinary art of human hands.

For a moment, we forget the daily chores, the burden of laborious existence, the tensions between family and friends and we become brothers and sisters in joyful commensality. Commensality means eating together around the same table (mensa) as used to be done -- all the family gathered together, talked, ate and drank at the table, parents, sons and daughters.

Commensality is so central that it is linked to the very emergence of human beings as human. Seven million years ago, the slow and progressive separation between the great apes and human beings, from a common ancestor, began. What's unique about human beings -- as distinct from animals -- is gathering food, distributing it among all, starting with the youngest and the elderly and then among the rest.

Commensality assumes cooperation and solidarity toward each other. It is what propitiated the leap from animality to humanity. What was true yesterday remains true today. That's why it grieves us so much to know that millions and millions have nothing to share and are hungry.

On September 21st, 2001, a known atrocity occurred: the planes crashed against the Twin Towers. About three thousand people died in the event.

On the same day exactly, 16,400 children under the age of five died of hunger and malnutrition. On the next day and throughout the year, twelve million children were victims of hunger. And no one was or is appalled by this human catastrophe.

On this Christmas of joy and brotherhood, we can not forget those who Jesus called "the least of my brothers and sisters" (Mt. 25:40) who can not receive presents or eat anything.

But despite this dejection, let us celebrate and sing, sing and rejoice because we will never be alone. The little boy is named Jesus, Emmanuel which means "God with us". This little verse that makes us think about our understanding of God, revealed at Christmas, is worthwhile:

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Christmas ornaments now shine in the streets and houses. The tree and the crèche are ready to receive Jesus, so he can be born. When I say Jesus, I don't mean some dogmas, whatever they may be. I'm talking about a life and a hope that renew the world. I'm naming what is already at the foundation of everything and the prophecy of what will fully be, if we make it so.

Let's make it so. What you believe doesn't matter but open your eyes and the deepest part of your being. May your eyes rejoice like those of a child when seeing the lights, the tree, and the crèche, and may they see everything through the light of the heart. May your heart, despite it all, keep on beating in peace, in the Peace that creates and transforms everything.

We certainly don't have it easy. The nth woman has been killed by chauvinist violence. More than three thousand immigrants have perished (murdered!) so far this year in the waters of the Mediterranean, and how many others have been "returned in a flash" to die without water or land, we know not. The nth climate summit has concluded without facing the planetary emergency, limiting itself to saving face with a vaporous agreement in stoppage time. Luis Alberto González has just been fired from his institute because the Diocese of Canarias has withdrawn his license to be a teacher of religion for having married his same-sex partner (it wouldn't be bad if Pope Francis would intervene in order to make very clear what this "welcoming homosexuals with mercy" means).

I'll continue. They tell us that the crisis is over but what's certain is that the rich are now much richer while the poor are much poorer and much more numerous, and through pure logic we may deduce that the crisis was invented by the rich -- now we know why. The 85 richest people in the world increase their fortunes by one million dollars a minute. Six of every ten young people in Spain are planning to emigrate to seek a future. They create jobs without increasing the total wages given out. Corruption has invaded the political system, which worships Mammon, and surely what's known up to now is just the tip of the iceberg that perhaps we'll never know but that exists and is sinking us. The financial powers appoint governments, rule the political parties, control the media, and this is called democracy and freedom. The United States and Europe are negotiating a treaty (TTIP) behind our backs so that the big companies can go on ruling the states at will.

And much more. The price of oil has gone down, not merely by chance but to sink Russia, Brazil, Venezuela, and Iran, dangerous rivals to the dominant system. The powerful appeal to human rights when it suits them and torture and kill without scruples whenever it's in their interest and they can (look at Guantanamo, look at the Middle East, look at Africa, "the sin of the West"). Ebola is no longer of interest because there are no longer any whites who are infected. And while all this is happening, they distract us with the mischief (or whatever) of "Little Nicholas"...Behold our world.

But no. There's another world that's warmer and more fraternal, and much more real. Another world is being proclaimed in the ruins of this world. Another world is being born each day in this world amid labor pains, from struggle and tenderness. A grandfather just told me, full of excitement, that a few days ago in a hospital in Madrid, his chubby, adorable grandson was born, a "gift of God" who has the whole family "over the moon." He has Down syndrome. Malala Yousafzai, a 17 year-old Pakistani young woman who was shot by the Taliban extremists for her advocacy for education for girls in her tortured country, has just received the Nobel Peace Prize. Countless social movements are lifting their voices and hands for this other world within this world, where all of us beings will be freer and more brotherly, and happier with less.

They are little lights lit in hearts and on trees. It's the true Christmas. It's the world Jesus saw coming, an unstoppable Advent. It's the world that he hoped for, that is, that he imagined and brought to birth from cradle to cross, from cross to resurrection. We can too. If we can look at these lights with the eyes of a child, if we let ourselves rejoice with a child's heart, then we can too. And even if we lose we will win, like Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

"My name is Maria José. I'm 11 years old and I want to share with you the experience of this beautiful day. A month ago, my grandmother, Maria Elena Sierra, died. Her wish was for me to make my First Communion before the end of December so we've fulfilled it. My grandfather, Gerardo Jaramillo Gonzales, a married Catholic priest, was the one who baptized me. Because of falling in love with my grandmother, he was sidelined from his ministry in the Church -- suffering and grief that we have always borne in the family.

On this day of my First Communion, I am accompanied by my family -- my grandfather, my parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, my little sister Maria Antonia, and two friends of my grandmother and the family.

In my family, we asked Olga Lucia to be the one to accompany us in a special way this day.

Olga Lucia left us brief thoughts on which to reflect: "Who are we? And what is our mission, our responsibility, in the world, in our families, in society, in the Church?"

"My grandfather spoke up to explain to us the importance of the commitment we are making when receiving the Eucharist: "...When we say 'This is My Body', 'This is My Blood', we are each one of us surrendering ourselves to the service of the Church, to the service of the Kingdom of God...making the presence of Christ real in the bread and the wine."

My grandfather, a married priest, and my mom give me Holy Communion. Olga Lucia explains why they are giving me Communion: "because Father Gerardo as a grandfather and priest, and Maria Elena, as a mom, have been the ones in the home who have nurtured the seeds of faith and Christian values in Maria José."

Then the rest of the attenders came to receive Communion. Olga Lucia was the last one to take Communion and we ended by giving thanks to God for his presence among us and we also invoked the presence of the Virgin Mary, Patroness of the Americas, the Virgin of Guadalupe.

Full of the presence of the Spirit-Ruah, we were invited to go out into the world with joy to proclaim the Gospel!"

We consider Fr. Gerardo's speech a blessing from Heaven despite his health and memory loss. It was like listening to him in his better days.

NOTE: Additional photos of the occasion are available by clicking on the link to "Evangelizadoras de los Apostoles Blog" at the top of the article.

The Lord Jesus opened the eyes of those two blind men who trusted that he would make them see, and they saw (Cf.Mt.9:27-31). But he, who didn't want to appear to be a thaumaturge, i.e. a miracle worker, ordered them not to tell anyone because his main task was to perform the delightful miracle of the total transformation of men, inside and out, the whole person, body and soul, everything. He came not to transform a few people but to transform the whole human family. However, those people who had been blind spread what Jesus had done for them everywhere.

This is happening now. You can't keep Jesus from opening the eyes of his daughters and sons. Some would like us to remain blind, for people to believe that they have to resign themselves to death caused by injustice. They would like to see people resigned to suffering impunity, they would like corruption not to be pointed out. This is impossible because, first when Jesus, with his Heavenly Father and the Holy Spirit the One God, created human beings, he created them in his image and likeness, which means that men and women are gifted with intelligence and will and, even when that intelligence and will was damaged by sin, Jesus came to forgive that sin and introduce divine life in man because God needs human beings to build the world according to His designs.

This is what those who are destroying the world, those who are tearing Mexico apart, don't want to understand: that we citizens are always going to demand to be part of the construction of the history of good and justice. At this moment the people's demands in face of the series of injustices they've been committing -- injustices the size of the one committed by the Mexican government in Iguala, Guerrero -- are unacceptable to them. Here in Saltillo and in Coahuila, we know of disappeared persons. Specifically people who come to the Fray Juan de Larios Diocesan Center for Human Rights who know about and denounce where the police are involved, when it's army personnel and when it's organized crime groups, but they're also aware of the complicity between public officials and criminals embedded within the government or organized as mafias through cartels in civil society. Which yields as a result impunity for the criminal actions of the forced disappearances of many citizens. And that's the responsibility of the Mexican government.

Ayotzinapa made manifest the criminal situations that have remained unpunished for years throughout the country

What has happened in Ayotzinapa is that everything has been committed in the spotlight. The police took these young students (normalistas) publicly and people know that the municipality with its principal authority, the mayor, the public safety body and all that is in the service of that municipality, is part of the Mexican government, because the municipality is one of the levels that, with the state and federal ones, form the three levels of government of Mexico. From the moment the mayor puts them under his control, he becomes responsible for their disappearance, and therefore it must be considered a state crime.

Now they're trying to make us think that the captors of the youth from Normal Rural were some paramilitaries under the command of Mayor Abarca, thus trying to tell us that they weren't municipal police but a particular armed group of the mayor. We know that in the municipalities and states of the Republic, the authorities are creating armed groups called "rapid reaction" or something similar. The state of Coahuila "officially" has GATES and during the past administration of the Saltillo municipality, GROMS was created, which are groups that serve as part of the state to maintain security. Both groups have been denounced as torturers and murderers, not just by migrants and prisoners but by citizens in general. We all understand that they're officially part of the state of Coahuila, so they're instruments of the government. That's it.

God is intervening in history and Our Most Holy Mother of Guadalupe said she would keep an eye on us. With the help of God who sustains His children and the light that our faith in the person of Jesus and the gospel he preached offers us, we can distinguish good from evil while we are still on this earth. This is what those who wish to remain in the dark with their crimes don't want to happen. That's why they want to silence us when we complain about their injustice, corruption and impunity. What solution will they offer? We've already heard it the last few days in the words of President Peña Nieto: even more repression.

They don't want to govern well? Let them get out!

Reading the prophet Isaiah, we tell them based on our faith, enough with their crimes, enough with their corruption, enough with their impunity, but we don't just tell them that. We proclaim with the gospel what God has said since ancient times:

"Surely, in a very little while, Lebanon shall be changed into an orchard, and the orchard be considered a forest! On that day the deaf shall hear the words of a scroll;
And out of gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind shall see. The lowly shall again find joy in the Lord, the poorest rejoice in the Holy One of Israel." (Is 29:17-19).

Saint Paul, in the Letter to the Romans, says that the Holy Spirit comes to our aid so that we might know what to ask God for in our prayers (Cf. Rm 8:26-27). We wonder how the Holy Spirit comes to our aid. To make us understand based on the gospel of Jesus that for the good of all in society, peace should be established and that to maintain it, we must watch that justice prevails in human relationships but that if it's lacking, we should demand from public authority the strengthening of justice, since it's the job of every political body in the state to establish law and justice. We know that God has been enlightening human beings throughout history through the innumerable disciples of Christ and thousands of people who adhere to universal values that govern lasting human relationships between women and men in society so that each day we find a more perfect way to establish law and justice, through the collaboration of honest people who emerge from the historic organization of the people themselves and are delegated by them to be in front as their rulers.

This is what the bad rulers want -- for us not to see, for us to remain blind to their misdeeds, and that's why they say that when we complain about injustice, we're destabilizing the country, we're seeking to overthrow the government. No, sir, what these people want is to be governed well and if they don't want to govern well, then let them get out.

The unexpected surprise of God's actions in history

Let's look ahead in the Isaiah text that was proclaimed a moment ago:

"For the tyrant shall be no more, the scoffer shall cease to be; all who are ready for evil shall be cut off, those who condemn with a mere word, who ensnare the defender at the gate, and leave the just with an empty claim." (Is. 29:20-21).

To understand the meaning of this text, important for shedding light on our Christian actions against the serious situation being experienced by Mexico, I refer to the end of the text of the prophet Isaiah proclaimed earlier, and Jesus' words, first to his disciples during the Last Supper and then before Pontius Pilate during the trial through which the Roman procurator sentenced him to death.

Isaiah says: "Those who err in spirit shall acquire understanding, those who find fault shall receive instruction." (Is 29:24) In this text, God is proclaiming through His prophet that what leads to reconciliation both for the one who causes injustice as well as the one who is bothered by it, is the truth. The same truth that breaks the vicious cycle of impunity that leads to the multiplying of the tyrant's crimes. Truth leads us out of the aberrations through which the tyrant is driving society, and forces him to accept responsibility for his crimes. Truth that breaks with impunity, returns tranquility to the society that had become discontented with the dictatorship of the tyrant.

Jesus, before his disciples, prayed for them to his Father in Heaven like this: "Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth...I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth." (Jn 17:17,19) In this sense, consecration means surrendering oneself totally for the truth. Jesus died for the truth, as if he had said "I'm consecrating myself in sacrifice for the truth." Before Pilate, when the latter insisted on asking if he really was a king, Jesus answered, "You say I am a king. For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice." Pontius Pilate was far from the truth because he wasn't interested in the welfare of those people since the people he was supposed to rule in the name of his friends, of his fellow tyrants, were ones he was primarily interested in exploiting, squeezing, and crushing. So to Jesus' answer, Pilate asks Jesus, "What is truth?" (Cfr. Jn. 18:32-38) Jesus consecrated his life for truth. He was being led to the sacrifice because he never denied the truth the Father had ordered him to teach and we his disciples, because of his sacrifice, are consecrated to defend and spread the truth he gave us in his gospel. To that end, during Jesus' last supper with his disciples, he pleaded with his Father, referring to them, "I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.."

Henceforth, the Holy Spirit comes to our aid, St. Paul says, so that we might know the truth about what a nation organized in justice and law should be, what a people who lives with dignity should be, an authentic way of governing, and a just economic system. That is, the true way of organizing the world. This is what the Gospel teaches us, this is what God teaches us, and this truth cannot be enclosed in the churches. We can't just remain in the truth Jesus taught us. We must proclaim it, we have to organize ourselves to live it.

When Isaiah says that those who err shall acquire understanding, what's the prophet proclaiming? Undoubtedly these words invite us to ask ourselves how we are going to cancel out the destructive power the corrupt have. The first answer that jumps out is this: through justice. Unfortunately they have power that is nefarious, with the multiplication of injustice. How will we bind up and destroy the lies they tell? Through the truth that comes out of our people, through our people's denunciations that ought to be heard in court, where there should be judges and ministers who work honestly and are fair. So, how important it is at this time for the very cynical injustice and corruption that we are witnessing to be denounced! It's impressive that this started through some young people so we can't leave them alone. We can't forget the many young people who are hoping for a better future. Moreover, are we going to let the children of our country live in a nation gone to dust and at the mercy of a few corrupt people? How are we going to leave these creatures alone? God calls us through the most defenseless people to restore this nation.

Mary of Guadalupe, a sign of hope and challenge

Mary of Guadalupe also came to us to proclaim the gospel of love and justice, she came to us to proclaim the gospel of truth, and she asked Saint Juan Diego for decisive collaboration with her. She did not admit any excuses from him; she ordered him to return to the bishop's house to obtain for her what she had asked -- to have a little house where she could hear our prayers, our afflictions and lamentations -- so she ordered him to put "every effort" into it. Nor does Mary admit any cowardice or laziness from us today, much less indolence. She doesn't want pastors who flee and hide in the face of the wolves or worse still, who associate with the wolves by complicit silence before the destruction of their people.

From the outset, we have placed the pastoral plan of our diocese in Mary of Guadalupe, because through it we seek to bring to Christian maturity first ourselves as shepherds of the people that we are, then each and every one of our faithful so that, by maturing in faith as disciples of Christ, with many people of good will who belong to other denominations and other faiths or simply are not attached to any creed, we might be the ones who truly dictate what this country should be, so that all injustice, all corruption and impunity might be overcome through a new organization of our country, founded on the strength of justice and law, and on the gentle impulse of love and compassion for our sisters and brothers who are suffering.

Monday, December 15, 2014

Cyprien Melibi is an African theologian who has been living in Spain a long time and working for the recognition of the way of doing Church from Africa that is unknown or viewed very prejudicially. Now he has published Grito africano ["African cry"] through which "we are trying to make known a different Africa, not the one of poverty, death and ebola" but "the one of hope and joy -- the positive Africa."

The Africa that is crying out, like your book, Grito africano por el derecho a existir, published by La Colección Diáspora, Religious Studies. Tell us a bit: What cry?"

First I want to share the enthusiasm and joy I feel because when I finished writing the book in June, I concluded by saying, "Africa, hope intact." And in Burkina Fasso we have just witnessed a resolution of a political crisis through a conensus of citizens, of forces, of the nation without resorting to any outside experts and what I'm suggesting in this book is exactly that -- that we are heading towards the African way of assuming its responsibilities. So first of all, before beginning this "cry," I want to start from that because it's something unprecedented in history -- that the people in the street oust a president, the military regains power and reacts peacefully and passes it on to a civilian.

Tell us about the book.

The book is a cry. Who's crying? It's the African who is suffering, the African who has been exploited for many centuries -- first he was subjected to slavery, then to colonization, then to post-colonization. It's the African who dreams of living well, being well, finding opportunities in his country and being able to travel normally to other countries. It's an African who is young for the most part but without a future, who is crying and he's crying out of hope and despair, he's crying out of pain and suffering. And where does this cry come from? It's a cry from the South, and you have to understand clearly that the problem of Africa is the problem of knowing how to empathize with us, that we're fed up with speeches, with being told how to do things when what we need is people who will put themselves in our place and try to understand.

Becoming African to build that Africa and also that theology of the Church in Africa, which has the ability and the role of building development and the Kingdom. What is this theology that's crying out in Africa, in which you've had theologian John Marcela as a teacher?

I think theology must basically be liberation theology because that way it can add to the freedom movement that is essential for every people. I know of no people in history that has freed itself without being committed. For me, it's key that theology participate in this liberation movement. That being said, I think that theology and religion in general must Africanize Christianity.

In Africa or all over the world?

No, no. In the context of Africa, because I think the Gospel is a message that's absolutely adaptable to all cultures, and the problem we've had for a long time is that we've tried to Christianize Africa and not Africanize Christianity...They're two very different things.

Can we talk about one Africa? Because we're talking about Africa as if it were one country but it's a heavily populated continent with many differences.

Yes, there are many cultural differences and normally one should speak of African cultures because there are various very distinct cultures. But in recent history we can observe that Sub-Saharan Africa has had common elements throughout its history and those elements have been common from slavery to post-colonization. This gives rise to a social context where the issues can be treated in almost the same manner. So when we're talking about the social problems in Africa, in this part of the continent almost the same realities are observed. I also want to mention that in Africa currently (it's one of the things I wanted to underscore in this book) there's a rise in awareness of being African and assuming our responsibilities. And in many environments -- intellectual, political and economic -- this awareness is important to emphasize that on this continent there are people who want to work for us to get out of this situation.

That's why when we're talking about liberation in Africa, whether at the political, economic, or theological level, there are three keys or important levels. I express the first one in the book the following way: "Take your hands off Africa." It's important for the people who are oppressing Africa to let us solve our problems, that they let us benefit from our resources. The second element or key is that it's impossible to make someone happy despite themselves. I can't come and say to you "Jesus [Bastante], this is what you need to be happy" and for it to be something in which you don't participate...That's one of the problems that has led us to this situation -- many things are conceived with a Western mentality and it's thought they should be applied intact in Africa. The third and final level I express with an African proverb that says, "And what if the fool got smart?", that is, that our homeland isn't stupid. They've done so many things to us -- they've exploited us, they're doing so many things to us, that we ought to become aware, to say this has to stop. Those are the three levels or keys for Africa.

On the book flap you've written: "We Christians of Africa don't want our Church to be complicit or collaborating with the executioners -- white or black -- of the African people, nor do we want a Christianity that is the opiate of the African people. We want our Church to assume its noble role of liberating the inner energy of the African." Is the African Church complicit?

The Church in Africa has mainly had two periods -- the mission period -- evangelization through the Europeans who gave what they had (I admire those people who went as if it were an adventure without knowing what would happen to them, some died of malaria, but they went generously to transmit European 19th century Christianity) and they transmitted it their way, with many positive things and negative ones too... I think the time to criticize this has passed), and the current period, since 1969 when Pope Paul VI came to Africa to tell Africans "you are now your own missionaries." From then on, the African Church entered a new phase -- a phase that belongs to us. And here I must lament that the African Church continues to be under the tutelage of the Western Church, and I don't know why it doesn't want to grow up, it doesn't want to assume its responsibility.

Now we have a Pope who isn't from Europe, who's from the South. Just as there's been a change here, do you notice this opportunity, this "spring" we were talking about in Africa?

You remember that a year ago when the Pope was being elected, I came through here and we were analyzing and talking about if this one was the Pope who was to come to Africa? I've come from Africa and just observed it and it's as if Francis' "spring" never got there because over there you don't experience what's currently happening in Rome, the fright the Pope is giving some of the more powerful sectors. And I don't understand why this is and I'm concerned because it isn't noted, you can't perceive it in Africa. And it's because the African Church has a very powerful ecclesial dynamism since bishops or pastors are immersed in their ministry, with full churches, and I don't know if they even have time to read the Pope's messages.

The Church in various African countries is having an important influence -- not just the missionaries but also the Church itself in its configuration, like in Southern Sudan, in Nigeria, where they are suffering a lot but go on working with their own identity...Is there a need for a papal trip or do you think we're talking about something else?

I've said it from the beginning -- this Pope has to really take an interest. Because John Paul II left us a lot but this Pope with his personal sensitivity and charisma, I think he would gain by going to Africa to be able to see the situation, not just from Rome. I'm sure that if Pope Francis were to organize a trip to Africa with his style, we would gain a lot. I participated in Benedict XVI's 2009 trip to Cameroon. He came in the "popemobile" and traveled a week earlier in a special private plane, etc...If Francis were to get rid of those things to come be in communion with the life of these people, I think the whole Church would gain a lot, and we're waiting for him over there -- I'm expecting much from this Pope and I'm praying for him a lot. I wish him a fruitful ministry in the Holy See. The African Church is crying here, hoping for a Good Samaritan to come down from Jerusalem to Jericho to learn about the one who's on the side of the road after having been attacked by bandits, who are the same ones as always, the same ones who are always exploiting Africa.

Let's hope that this "African cry" you talk about in your book will be a reality that can also be cried out by other voices.

Yes, it's what I think is important -- that the issue of Africa is an issue of shared responsibility by Africans and the rest of the world. We can't say that now Africa has to solve it -- Africans by themselves -- just as we also can't say that the colonizers have to solve it alone. It's an issue of shared responsibility. I want to end by quoting Frantz Fanon, one of the great negritude thinkers, who said "Each generation must discover its mission, fulfill it or betray it." This generation of Africans and the rest of the world must understand the Africa mission from every level and competency and how to fulfill it or betray it. And history will tell us how we've performed.